Category Archives: Fundamental or Human Rights
Margaretha Wewerinke-Singh, ‘Climate Protection Obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights: The KlimaSeniorinnen Judgment’
INTRODCUTION On 9 April 2024, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (the Court) delivered its much-anticipated judgment in Verein KlimaSeniorinnen Schweiz and Others v Switzerland. The case, brought by a Swiss association of elderly women and four individual applicants, alleged that Switzerland’s inadequate action on climate change violated their rights under […]
Joseph Singer, ‘Living Property’
ABSTRACT The Supreme Court has increasingly defined property rights that are per se exempt from regulation in the absence of compensation, most recently in Cedar Point Nursery v Hassid (2021) and Tyler v Hennepin County (2023). The Court claims that it can identify property rights that are categorically protected from regulation by reference to history, […]
Schwartz, Reinert and Pfander, ‘Empiricism and Constitutional Torts’
ABSTRACT The Supreme Court has deliberately framed the law of constitutional torts as a balance between assuring redress for victims, deterring misconduct, and maintaining effective government services. Yet as the Supreme Court has shaped the contours of litigation against state and local actors (under 42 USC § 1983) and federal actors (under the Bivens doctrine), […]
‘Death by Omnibus? The European Commission’s Proposal and the Fate of the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive’
The European Union’s (EU) Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) was intended as a paradigm shift in mandating, harmonizing, and reinforcing corporate respect for human rights and the environment across the continent. Adopted in mid-2024 following fraught negotiations, the Directive – in its original form – was poised to enforce a standardized, mandatory framework for […]
William Organek, ‘Purdue’s Side Effects: Using Due Process to Realign Mass Tort Bankruptcies’
ABSTRACT In Harrington v Purdue Pharma, the United States Supreme Court held that victims of the opioid crisis could not be forced to release their independent claims against the Sacklers, who owned and controlled Purdue, without the victims’ consent. Such releases had become a controversial mainstay of mass tort bankruptcy filings. Yet Purdue was decided […]
Mariana Valente, ‘Terms of Service as a Case of Legal Pluralism’
ABSTRACT While discussions involving free speech often revolve around individual rights against the government, recent developments in technologies related to the Internet raise questions regarding new forms of censorship practiced by private Internet service providers. Past experiences, such as the movie pictures private regulation by the Production Code, illustrate how private agreements and practices can […]
Ciara Torres-Spelliscy, ‘“I miss my name”: Why Election Workers Turn to Defamation Law to Defend Democracy’
ABSTRACT Defamation law was one of the only effective ways to hold actors who undermined the 2020 and 2022 elections in the United States accountable. Defamation lawsuits were utilized by election workers to push back against election deniers. While criminal law largely failed to hold election deniers accountable, this aspect of tort law which has […]
Vols and Mohammadi, ‘The Right to Property in the ECHR: An Exploratory Data Science Analysis’
ABSTRACT Article 1 of the First Protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights (FP ECHR) ensures the right to the peaceful enjoyment of possessions, which has been the focus of considerable litigation. This paper intends to address the deficiency in a detailed analysis of Article 1 FP ECHR cases by employing data science methods, […]
‘UK tort law on human rights abuses in supply chains: The Dyson Litigation’
This blog considers the extent to which UK courts are willing to adjudicate upon harms committed overseas in connection with UK company supply chains … Recent years have seen a steady stream of litigation brought against UK parent companies for the environmental harm and human rights abuses caused by their overseas subsidiaries. This blog considers […]
Antonia Layard, ‘Public Land Law’
ABSTRACT While legislation and administrative frameworks shape how landowners own or use their land, land law continues to be understood primarily as a private law subject. Public interventions are conventionally treated as outside land law’s remit and are rarely addressed in property theorization. Responding to this absence, this article outlines the scope of public land […]